Forget Sandy, here are the strangest US stock market closures

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Sorry Sandy, but you’re not all that special. At least where the stock market is concerned.

Over the decades, a number of weather events have shuttered floor trading of stocks on Wall Street. Who could forget the blizzard of 1888, which shut trading on March 12-13 of that year? Just shy of 100 years later, Hurricane Gloria finagled another day off for traders on Sep. 27, 1985. In between, a number of snowstorms and some extremely hot days either shortened or closed trading.

And then there are a range of other events that curtailed trading over the years, such as the outbreak of war, assassinations of US presidents and terrorist attacks. But there have been some downright unusual days off too. Here are some of the more interesting.

June 12 – Dec. 31, 1968 : A massive paperwork backlog that developed in the late 1960s along with a surge in trading volume forces the NYSE to move to a four-day week—closed Wednesdays—as clerks try to get caught up.